


Temptation

by PenguinofProse



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff with a smutty ending, Found Family, Impregnation Kink, Post-Episode: s05e13 Damocles Part 2, Smut, Thirsting, but somehow it works I think, family fluff meets smut, flustered bellamy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:07:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25430635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PenguinofProse/pseuds/PenguinofProse
Summary: Diverges from canon at 5.13. Shallow Valley survives. Clarke and Bellamy take responsibility for building a new society there. Bellamy is having a hard time keeping his feelings for Clarke platonic.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake & Madi, Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin, Clarke Griffin & Madi
Comments: 42
Kudos: 359





	Temptation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OnlyZouzou](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnlyZouzou/gifts).



> Hello! This was a request for Bellamy thirsting over badass confident maternal Clarke if Shallow Valley never got destroyed. Inspired by the flustered Bellamy vibes at the start of S6. Huge thanks to Stormkpr for betaing as always. Happy reading!

Bellamy is annoyed with himself.

That's not news, right? Self-loathing is basically his greatest talent, and has been for as long as he can remember. But today he's annoyed with himself for a ridiculous reason.

He just can't keep his eyes off Clarke.

It's pathetic. Utterly and completely ridiculous. He left her to die, and came home with a new girlfriend, and they're only tentatively friends again after everything that happened in Polis. And he has better things to do, anyway, than staring at his old friend. He ought to be doing his part to get this new society they are building in Eden established and flourishing. He's got hunting parties to organise, patrols to timetable, guards to train.

But Clarke is currently standing in the middle of the village giving urgent instructions to Gaia, and it's just doing something for him, OK? He can't help it. Seeing her all riled up and decisive has always had a way of getting him going.

It seems that's something that not even six years and two substantial betrayals can change.

…...

He tries to avoid temptation for the rest of the day. By which he means, of course, that he tries to avoid _Clarke_ for the rest of the day. But she just keeps springing up and surprising him, wherever he goes.

"Can you give me a hand shifting these crates to medical?" She ambushes him to make the demand, shortly before lunch.

He doesn't know why the de facto leader of this society is lugging crates around. That's what Eligius are for, as far as he's concerned. And frankly he thinks it's inconsiderate of Clarke to do it herself, because she looks somehow _fierce_ and has a slight sheen of sweat across her forehead and looks every inch the strong survivor she is.

And, to be clear, he likes that look more than he really ought to.

He agrees, and moves a crate or two. And then he runs away, and orders a few guards around, because that's his job, now.

She pops up again, a couple of hours later.

"Bellamy. Hey. Look, the team guarding the guns are refusing to give them to your guys and they're about ready to start trading blows. Could you go and fix it, please?" She asks, impatiently pushing her hair back from her face in distress.

He tries not to stare. "Yeah. Yeah, sure. Sorry. Of course."

She's still not done. She finds him three more times before the day is out, each time with a request and a confident attitude that has his cheeks growing hot.

He's almost beginning to wonder if she's seeking him out deliberately, but that can't be right. That would imply they're still on good terms, and she still enjoys his company, and he's not so convinced that can possibly be true, after everything that happened in Polis.

By the time Echo finds him to go to supper together, he's half way to losing his mind. He tries to arrange his face into a neutral expression, but the problem with having a spy for a girlfriend is that she sees right through him.

"Are you OK, Bellamy? What is it? Please tell me you haven't had another fight with Clarke."

"No. No, it's not that."

Echo has been very reasonable about the existence of Clarke, more or less. Well, _slightly_ reasonable – she has at least consented to forgive her for Bellamy's sake, and managed to say that she's happy for him that he's patching up his friendship with her.

So he doesn't really have the heart to admit that Clarke has his pulse racing, today, in a way that Echo has never managed in all the three years they've been together.

…...

Bellamy has always found Clarke attractive. He doesn't see the harm in admitting that to himself, now that he's in no danger of acting on it. He's got Echo, and is about as happy as he deserves to be – that is to say, not particularly happy, but basically fine. Clarke has made it perfectly clear that Madi is her priority, and is quite enough of a family for her liking.

So they're both fine, and platonic, and _separate_. That means there's no danger in acknowledging that his former best friend is hot, right? There's no problem with his face heating every time she smiles at him, no problem with him staring at the way the light catches her hair. No problem with his eyes dropping to her lips or even lower to her cleavage.

No problem, that is, until he catches himself and remembers that's anything but appropriate.

It's worse when he's not just looking, when they're actually interacting, talking and bickering as they always used to do when they first arrived on the ground.

"We don't need to patrol." She's telling him today, tone sharp. "There's no reason to patrol. We're the only people left on Earth. There's no one outside this village to attack us."

"Better safe than sorry." He says, as much to prolong the conversation as because he actually thinks she's wrong.

"Bellamy. I lived here for six years. Trust me when I say there is no one out there."

He frowns. He cannot help it. He was enjoying this conversation, when it was a mostly-lighthearted exchange of opinions and she was arguing with fire in her eyes. But now she's reminding him that he left her here alone, and she looks as sad at the thought as he feels.

"What do you want me to have the guards do instead?" He asks, the fight draining out of him. She peers up at him, surprise in her gaze. She didn't expect him to give in, but he's changed a bit in the time they were apart.

"We could use some help with constructing the school. I know it's heavy labour and not what they're trained for but -"

"They'll do it." He concludes, cutting her off. "They'll understand that building the village has to be the priority now."

He will make sure of it. After all, if the school gets built without complaint, Clarke might find herself smiling more at him, and he certainly wouldn't object to that.

…...

He makes a distressing discovery, the next morning. He always knew he was attracted to Clarke giving orders, and Clarke smiling, and Clarke generally being the Clarke he used to know.

But today, it seems, he is destined to face a new and frightening truth.

It's the first day that most of the guards are scheduled to help out with the building work rather than running through the woods. Bellamy makes a point of being the first to arrive at the school building site, not long after dawn. He figures that looking keen to support Clarke's new society cannot hurt with his plan to reaffirm their friendship.

It's interesting that Clarke is the one calling the shots in this new society, of course. No one has forgotten that she drove out of Polis with all speed when Madi was made the Commander. But it seems that they have forgiven her, more or less, since she managed to negotiate peace with the Eligius prisoners.

Clarke is the next after Bellamy to arrive at the building site. That shouldn't surprise him – she's always been like this, and he can well remember seeing in the dawn with her a time or two at the dropship. But hot on Clarke's heels today comes Madi, and he doesn't know what to make of that. He barely knows the child, and he has to admit he's a little intimidated by her closeness with Clarke.

Madi is not intimidated. So much is clear, when she bounds towards him at a run.

"Bellamy! Clarke didn't say you'd be here." She turns to her mother, frowning.

"I didn't know he'd be here." Clarke contributes, smiling a tentative smile.

"You knew." He argues with spirit. "You asked for the guards to be here instead of patrolling."

"I didn't know the _head of security_ was going to be here himself. And hours before everyone else." She teases.

This is good, he decides. Progress with friendship: achieved.

Madi, it seems, is a perceptive child and has worked out Clarke's plan. "The guards are going to help build the school? So I can go to school sooner?"

"So all of you kids can go to school sooner, Madi." Clarke corrects gently, crouching down to look her daughter right in the eyes. "You looking forward to that?"

Madi nods, eager, and Clarke pulls her into a heartfelt hug.

Bellamy nearly passes out. It's stupid, but it's genuinely the truth. He thought he knew everything there was to know about his pesky attraction to his good friend, but as he shifts awkwardly and turns to take a bracing walk around the building site he learns something new.

Clarke is never more stunning than when she's embracing her role as Madi's mother.

…...

He loses the plot, slightly, after that. He finds himself seeking out examples of Clarke showing her maternal side, and finds out that her maternal side has a lot of different aspects to it he can admire. There's the moment where she reprimands Madi firmly for being rude to Murphy, and explains that her words were a little too on the nose to come across as the affectionate joke she intended, with the perfect balance of strictness and reassurance. There's Clarke the supportive mother, too, giving Madi a big hug and wishing her luck as she runs off to play soccer and make friends.

He spends a bit of time with Clarke and Madi while they're showing the more fun, lighthearted side of their relationship one morning. Madi is running towards the meadow with what looks like an improvised kite under her arm, dragging her mother by the hand.

"Bellamy!" Madi catches sight of him. "Look, Bellamy! We made a kite! You want to come help us fly it?"

He hesitates. He's the head of security. Also responsible for putting that chip in Madi's head and substantially reducing her opportunities for carefree childish fun like this.

"Bellamy's busy, Madi. He doesn't have time to fly kites with us." Clarke explains, and he thinks she sounds a bit disappointed by the thought.

That's what makes his mind up. "I can spare a few minutes to fly a kite. If you don't mind me joining you, of course." He adds, a little nervous that she might mind, actually.

Madi is already jumping with joy. "This is going to be great, Bellamy. Are you good at kite flying?" She asks, already running ahead rather than pausing to listen to his answer.

"I've never flown a kite." He admits to Clarke in a stage whisper as they follow Madi into the meadow.

She laughs, and the sound has warmth pooling in the pit of his stomach. "You'll work it out. We tried it a few times while you guys were in space. Just pick a windy day, throw it up in the air, and hope for the best."

"There's not much wind today." He is hesitant as he points out the flaw in the plan.

"No. You're right. But we had a little free time and Madi loves flying the kite."

With that, she is off, running towards her daughter across the meadow, and he is left watching her retreating back. Her new hair bounces differently when she runs, he notes. Of course, it's not _new_ as such, just new to him. It suits her, he decides. It frames her face beautifully, and it suits the new air of mature confidence she's acquired.

It makes him feel old and drab, with his longer hair and the beard he grew while he was mourning her.

Not that it matters, of course. It doesn't matter that she _looks_ out of his league, these days. Because she's always been out of his league in every way that matters – integrity, for example, and inner strength.

Anyway, he's with Echo. He should probably have remembered that sooner.

He stops fretting about such things and gets on with enjoying himself. Madi is running towards him, proffering the kite, while Clarke has hold of the strings some distance away.

"Bellamy! Bellamy, you have to throw the kite up! You're taller than me or Clarke."

"How do I do it?" He asks, taking his duty seriously. He has let Madi down, before now, but he's at least going to prove himself capable of flying a kite.

"You just wait for a gust of wind and throw."

He tries to do that. Really, he does. But there aren't a lot of gusts of wind today, and he does actually have to get to work some time in the not too distant future. So in the end, after many cheerful reprimands from Madi, he just goes for it, launching the kite into the air with more enthusiasm than elegance.

It's a total failure. There's not a breath of wind. The kite crashes straight back to Earth, and one corner clips him across the cheek as it falls.

All at once, Clarke is dashing to his side, inspecting the non-existent damage.

"It's not deep." She declares, relieved, brushing a finger over his face.

He doesn't push her away. Apparently he enjoys torturing himself with the temptation of what he cannot have.

"It's a scratch." He corrects her, and his voice sounds husky even to his own ears.

"Yeah. Yeah, a scratch." She nods, sounding strangely distressed at the thought. "We should be more careful. You could have lost an eye, Bellamy."

"Clarke, I'm fine. We're flying a kite, not fighting a war."

She does stop touching his cheek eventually. But he thinks that, probably, she could have stopped sooner.

…...

He's lost his mind.

That's the only logical explanation for his newfound obsession with hanging out with Madi and Clarke. That's why he cannot stop reliving the feel of Clarke's fingers brushing over his scratched cheek. That's why he keeps seeking her out around the village, or watching her give her orders out of the corner of his eye.

He does the only logical thing. Or, rather, he does the only thing that _seems_ logical, to a guy who has lost his mind.

He breaks up with Echo.

…...

He sometimes wonders whether breaking up with Echo was the right move, in the days and weeks that follow. It's not as if Clarke cares whether he's single or taken. It's not as if she's going to fall, delirious with desire, into his arms just because he no longer has a girlfriend.

No. It was definitely the right move. It would be dishonest to stay with Echo when he's beginning to remember that he's always been a little bit obsessed with Clarke Griffin. And anyway, he was becoming seriously concerned that he would end up crying Clarke's name in bed, sooner or later.

It's just that breaking up with Echo leaves him lonely.

He shakes it off. He has other friends. He tries to rebuild his friendship with Miller, learns to forgive him for supporting Octavia. He even starts tentatively reconciling with Octavia, one painstaking conversation about the weather at a time.

And yeah, sure, he spends rather more time than is truly wise hanging out with Clarke.

"Can I help you with anything today?" He asks her, bright and early one morning, as he walks past her in the village. Just because he likes to be helpful, of course, not because he's hoping for an opportunity to stare at her lips.

That would be creepy, and he's trying very hard not to be creepy. Has he mentioned, yet, that he really is ashamed of himself sometimes?

She just looks confused. "We're not working on the school today." She reminds him.

"Yeah. Yeah, I know. I wasn't asking if there was anything to do for the school. I just – you know – we used to help each other out, you and me."

She snorts. "I've managed six years without you. I think I can settle a couple of squabbles and sketch out a design for a new med bay by myself."

"Yeah, of course." He feels like an idiot, so he puts his hands on his hips and tries to adopt a confident pose.

He's not sure it works. Surely she can see his embarrassment bleeding through?

Maybe she can. Maybe that's what does it. Maybe her next offer is born of pity, not affection.

"Have you had breakfast yet? We could eat together if you don't mind giving me a minute to fetch Madi?" She suggests, apparently genuine.

Well, now. He's not going to say no to that.

…...

He's been broken up from Echo a good couple of weeks before Clarke mentions it. There's no sense in trying to read anything into that fact, he thinks. Clarke has a village to run, a society to rebuild. She has better things to do than keep up to date with her friends' love lives.

When she does ask him about it, she asks him about it directly, confidently, without beating about the bush. Of course she does – she's Clarke.

"I heard you and Echo broke up?" She's peering at a map rather than meeting his eyes.

"Yeah. Yeah, we did."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Let me know if you want to talk about it. I'm always here to listen." She offers, softly, still staring at that map.

He makes an agreeing sort of noise, but he's not really agreeing. It's ridiculous that Clarke is offering to talk about his breakup when she has a settlement to build, but that's who she is. Warmth and business, inextricably – and sometimes inexplicably – intertwined.

He adds _sympathetic Clarke_ to his list of maddeningly attractive Clarkes, and excuses himself to attend a non-existent security meeting.

…...

It's not that Bellamy has been looking for excuses to hang out with Clarke, or anything. But when she leaves her jacket at the firing range and Miller is on his way to drop it off at her house, it just seems sensible for him to volunteer to take it instead.

He hasn't been to her house yet. He can't explain why. They talk several times a day, eat meals together often, and are laughing easily with each other almost like they used to before everything went wrong in that bunker. But inviting himself into her home seems like a whole new step in their friendship, and he wouldn't want to make her uncomfortable by trying to cross that line too soon. Apart from anything else, her home is the space she shares with Madi, and he's not sure he's allowed into that part of her life, after persuading Madi to take the flame.

He knows where her home is, though. Not because he's a creepy stalker. He's trying not to be creepy for all he's worth, right now.

He knocks on the door, jacket clutched in his fist. Madi answers the door, and that takes him by surprise, somehow.

"It's Bellamy." The child throws the words over her shoulder.

All at once Clarke is there, bustling down the hallway, looking a little flustered. And Clarke looking flustered has a funny way of making _him_ feel flustered, and so now they're both flustered.

He thinks he sees Madi roll her eyes.

"Bellamy. Hey." Clarke greets him. "What are you doing here?"

"You left your jacket." He explains, holding the offending item out to her.

She takes it, practically snatches it out of his hand. And then all three of them stand there for a while on the doorstep, and this time Madi _definitely_ rolls her eyes.

"We were just starting a movie." Madi informs him. "Would you like to join us?"

"Oh. I – erm -"

"Madi's got very into movies since I brought home one of the spare Eligius tablets." Clarke offers, tone strangely apologetic.

He nods. "Movies can be fun. I used to like to watch them with my sister when we were younger."

"Is that a yes, then?" Madi asks.

"What?" He's not keeping up, here. Damn Clarke and her distracting face.

"Is that a yes to joining us for the movie?" She persists.

"You'd be very welcome." Clarke adds.

Well, now. That's that settled. He only came here to drop off a jacket, but next thing he knows, he's sitting in Clarke and Madi's living room. The thing about watching a movie on a small tablet is that they have to sit quite close together for it to be practical. They arrange themselves on the couch, Clarke in the middle, with Madi on one side of her and Bellamy on the other.

He shouldn't complain about these seating arrangements. He's good friends with Clarke, of course, so it's nice that she's comfortable inviting him into his house and all. But sitting in close proximity to her like this, he's afraid that his inappropriate attraction to her is showing on his face and in his clumsy body language.

It gets worse, because of course it does. That's just his luck, isn't it? Clarke reaches an arm around Madi, and he's sat there awkwardly watching mother and daughter share a heartfelt cuddle with their movie night. It's good to see her being so affectionate with Madi like this. It's a lovely chance to see her openly displaying that warmth that burns so brightly in her, but that she mostly keeps hidden during the course of her day job.

He used to think he was the only person who got to see that warmth, so he's not sure how he feels about the idea that she shares that part of herself with Madi, now. He perhaps ought to be jealous, but he simply can't be. He's too busy being happy for the two of them, if he's being honest.

OK, if he's being really honest, he's too busy staring slightly adoringly at Clarke.

Is that creepy? This ought to be a really innocent moment, he's pretty sure. She's just cuddling her daughter and watching a movie. But somehow the whole scene gets him started on thinking about what a great mother she is.

And that gets him thinking about how she should have more children.

Specifically, she should have children with _him_.

That's where it all falls apart, for good and forever. That's where he reaches the point of no return. He passes that awkward attraction phase and falls straight into full-on fantasising about her, dreaming of exactly how they might go about conceiving those children together. Imagining her lips opening in a breathy gasp, her body soft and yielding beneath him, her confident mouth sucking bruises into the tender skin of his neck.

He's screwed. Completely and utterly screwed. And he must remember never to gatecrash Clarke and Madi's movie night again.

…...

Madi walks up to him in the supper queue three days later.

"We're watching Shrek tonight." She announces, as if that's supposed to mean something to him.

He remembers Shrek. He used to like Shrek, when he was a kid, for its cynical fairy tale and mythology references. No, that's not relevant, here.

"Bellamy? Hello?" Madi waves a hand sarcastically in front of his face. When did this child become such a teenager? "Are you coming to watch Shrek? Clarke said I should ask you."

Well, now. He can't let Clarke down, can he?

"Thanks, Madi. I'd like that. I'll be there."

…...

They've been living in Eden for a couple of months when Clarke first shows up to a training session Bellamy is leading for the guards. He allows himself to wonder, very briefly, if there's something afoot, here, and if her sudden appearance has anything to do with watching _Percy Jackson_ last night and talking about their plans for the next day.

No, that can't be right. She's the leader of her people, and she has a child and her independence and a life, and there's no way she'd be showing up to a training session just because he mentioned he was leading it. Just because he becomes a flustered mess whenever she's nearby doesn't mean it cuts both ways, he chastises himself firmly.

"Hey. Didn't expect to see you here." He says, trying to keep his tone light.

She smiles. "I guess I thought I'd better stay in shape. I haven't been keeping up my fitness since I got so busy."

He nods. That seems more logical than her wanting to hang out with him. He resists the temptation to add that she is most definitely _in shape_ , as far as he can tell, because he figures that wouldn't be appropriate.

She continues. "And since you said you were taking the session today it seemed a good day to show up. You'll partner with me, right? You'll go easy on me?"

"Yeah, sure I will." He agrees easily, tugging her into a sort of comradely half-hug he immediately regrets. It was a stupid gesture, he thinks, and he's a bit of a sweaty mess, and she must be desperate to get away from him.

She doesn't pull away, though. She seems content to lean into his side for several long moments, and that doesn't do his sanity any good at all.

He forces himself to let her go and get on with the session. He gives a few instructions and tips, checks all the guards have paired up appropriately, and then turns to Clarke.

He's fairly sure that partnering with Clarke is a mistake, at this point. He's substantially larger than her, and he's been training with Echo for six years. Sure, Clarke is smart and fast, but that's not going to cut it, he fears. Yet he doesn't want to go so easy on her that he patronises her. On balance, he suspects that this only ends one way.

Sure enough, before long she is flat on her back on the floor, as he finds himself kneeling on her upper arms and looking down into her eyes.

This was definitely a mistake. This was a mistake on so many levels. She's panting, and her eyes are full of fire, and it has him thinking all sorts of inappropriate thoughts about seeing a similar expression on her face in his bed. And he's literally straddling her, with her breasts warm and soft beneath him, so it's surely no surprise when his cock starts stirring in his pants.

He can't run away. That would look suspicious. All he can do is kneel here and will his arousal into submission.

For the first time in his life he wonders if it might have been more convenient not to be a guy, right now. In this moment he would happily trade a lifetime of being able to pee standing up for some hope of being more subtle in his arousal.

"You got me." Clarke tells him, face glowing, still breathless.

"You put up a good fight." He says, because to be fair she was far from hopeless.

"I always do." She tells him, brow cocked.

Yeah, she needs to quit using that tone. It's really not helping his current awkward situation.

He gets up off her, slowly, and casts about for something to say. Something other than begging her to take him home right this instant and have her way with him, preferably. He thinks that would probably be a pretty effective way of ruining their friendship.

"You favour your right leg." He observes, trying to move the conversation back to the strictly appropriate.

"Yeah." She shrugs. "Got it caught in a bear trap six years ago."

He feels the ground fall away under his feet, tries to keep his jaw firm and his torso upright. "A _bear trap_?"

"Yeah. It's fine, Bellamy. I stitched it up. I'm OK."

He knows she survived six years down here without him. But he knows it on a logical level, he thinks, rather than feeling the truth of it in his heart. Every time she lets slip something about what she went through while he was gone, it shocks him all over again.

He wonders if Clarke will ever stop taking him by surprise.

…...

Bellamy seems to have failed in his resolution not to attend Clarke and Madi's movie nights. Whatever, it's not a big deal. He's been responsible for worse failures before now – and that's putting it mildly.

It's when he stops waiting for an explicit invitation that he knows he's screwed.

It's a perfectly normal evening. He eats supper with Clarke and Madi, because that's mostly what he does, now. He tries very hard not to stare too hard at Clarke, because that's kind of a habit of his, too. And then all three of them finish eating and head back to Clarke and Madi's house, because that's what they do each night, these days.

"What do you want to watch tonight, Madi?" Clarke asks as they walk.

Madi looks thoughtful. "Maybe we could do something else? We watch a lot of movies. Could we draw instead?"

"I don't think Bellamy's really into drawing, honey." Clarke points out, eyes flitting to him as if concerned.

He rushes to set her mind at rest, to explain that it doesn't matter what he's into, that he can just go home. "That's OK. Go for it, draw. I'll see -"

"He doesn't need to be into drawing." Madi interrupts him briskly. "He can read. Or just sit and chat with us while we draw."

"He could read." Clarke agrees easily.

He wonders about pointing out that they're talking about him as if he's not there, but he decides not to bother, in the end. He's quite fond of the pair of them, and wouldn't like to sound critical. Criticising Clarke used to be one of his favourite pastimes, he seems to remember. But he's not feeling quite so confident about the state of their friendship, these days.

They arrive back at the house, and Madi presents him with the tablet and informs him that it holds a small library of books, as well as the movies. He nods, expresses his gratitude, and accepts it, but he's not destined to get much reading done.

Clarke is sitting next to him, much as she usually would on a movie night. Only of course they don't need to crowd together to see the screen, tonight, and Madi is sitting in a chair on the far side of the room while she sketches.

So why oh why is Clarke leaning so close up against him? He could swear she doesn't usually sit this near even when they are cramped together to watch a movie. Is she trying to drive him insane?

If she is, it's working. It turns out that watching Clarke draw has a way of getting him going, too – because of course it does. He's pretty certain that _everything_ she does gets him turned on at this point.

She's concentrating, hard, face drawn into a tight frown that makes him want to kiss the little knot in her brow. He knows he ought to be looking at his book, but really, she's much more interesting. And then it gets even worse when he realises what she's drawing – it's him, laughing at some joke he can no longer remember, when they walked into each other by the well this afternoon.

He wonders if, one day, she might have cause to draw his face resting against her pillow, his body tangled in the sheets of her bed, his lips -

No. Too far. He's not going there. He's not _allowed_ to go there.

"Bellamy?" Clarke chooses this moment to look up at him, of course. "Are you OK?"

"Yeah. Yeah, fine." He lies through his teeth. "Just noticed what you're drawing."

She grins, eyes dancing, and he wonders whether he might be about to pass out from the heady cocktail of desire and shame currently stealing over his body.

Then she bends to rest her head on his shoulder, curves her right hand around his arm while she keeps drawing with her left, and he thinks that at least if he expires right now he'll die happy.

…...

Clarke keeps showing up to his training sessions. It's funny, because when he asks Miller about the sessions he leads in Bellamy's absence, his old friend just smirks and says that Clarke only joins in when Bellamy is teaching them.

Bellamy doesn't let himself get his hopes up. Much.

OK, he's ashamed to admit it, but he likes to think it might mean something. It might mean that she considers him a real friend again, if nothing else.

He doesn't allow himself to give into the temptation of dreaming that it means anything more than that.

They're on target practice today. Bellamy's pretty certain Clarke doesn't need to be here – she can already shoot, more or less, and she must have better things to spend her time on. Maybe, he wonders, she's hoping he might wrap his arms around her and help her out with her rifle, like he did all those years ago in that supply depot.

No. That's not appropriate. And they're working with pistols today – literally all she needs to do is point and shoot.

"You OK?" He asks her, when she's next in line to step up and take aim at the target.

She nods, grinning at him. He likes that she smiles a lot more, since they started to thrive in Eden. "I'm good. You got any tips for me?"

"You don't need tips from me. You know what you're doing." He tells her truthfully.

She seems to like that, nodding and smiling even wider as she steps up to the mark.

He watches her carefully, of course. Just because he's teaching this session, not because he's a creep, or anything. He watches as she plants her feet firmly, extends her left arm, takes careful aim.

He watches as she squeezes the pistol in a tight grip, as she touches the trigger almost _delicately_ , and just for a moment, just a heartbeat, his mind wanders to the question of what those decisive fingers might do wrapped around his cock.

But then she shoots, and the sound startles him out of his fantasy not a moment too soon.

"Did you see that?" She asks him, exultant, pointing at the target. "That was a good one."

"Yeah." He swallows stickily. "Great shot. Well done."

He pulls her into a hug. And he definitely does that because one good shot in a training session is an achievement worth celebrating, and because they are close friends, and congratulating her on her trivial achievement is a worthwhile thing to do.

He definitely doesn't do it because he wants an excuse to nuzzle his nose into her neck.

…...

Early afternoon the next day he's walking through the village minding his own business when Clarke calls out to him.

She's eating an apple, biting into it firmly, and there might be juice on her lips or he might be imagining things.

Probably he's imagining things. He does seem to have lost his mind, where Clarke is concerned.

"Bellamy, hey!"

He waves at her. Pining fool that he is, he actually _waves_ , like some excited kid. In that moment he just can't think of anything else to do – it's not like he's going to be able to form actual words, while she's standing there eating that apple like some damn _siren_ or something.

So, yeah, that's a thing he's learnt today. It turns out that even an apple can be a tool of seduction, in the right hands and on the right lips.

…...

This is getting silly, now. It's reached the point where Clarke doing pretty much _anything_ can get Bellamy all riled up. She'll be giving a speech to the whole village updating them on the progress made with building the school, but he'll sit there in the audience and dream of her whispering dirty talk in his ear – or perhaps screaming his name so loudly in her pleasure that it echoes off her bedroom walls and out into the world, proclaiming to the whole of Eden that she's _his_ , and his alone.

Huh. That got out of hand.

Anyway, the point is, it's stupid. But it's not just the constant nag of sexual attraction that's getting ridiculous – it's also his desperate desire to be near her, to make her laugh, to take care of her and Madi.

It hits him all at once, one evening, as they sit together in on that couch and watch some animated comedy about a fish, and Bellamy tries to justify the fact that he's allowed himself to put his arm around her.

He's in love with her.

He's _loved_ her for years, of course. But for a long time he tried to pretend to himself that he loved her as a friend, or as a leader who had his wholehearted devotion, or something naive like that. And that his pesky attraction to her was just a footnote. And that his single-minded dedication to her wellbeing was just – well, he's not sure how he ever overlooked that.

But he gets it, now. He's in love with her, in the full-on romantic, absolute, _soulmates_ kind of way.

Of course, Clarke being Clarke, she chooses that exact moment to look up at him.

"Sorry." She whispers. "Another kids' cartoon. You must be sick of these."

"I never get sick of movie nights with you two." He tells her, and he means it.

…...

They've been living in Eden some months before Clarke declares that the medical centre is ready for one very important procedure.

It's time for Madi to have the flame removed.

Bellamy expected more drama, if they ever got to this point. He expected Madi and Clarke to argue over it, because the girl seems to have inherited a rather martyr-like streak from her foster mother and takes her duties seriously. He expected, too, that it would cause the old demons between him and Clarke to rear their ugly heads, and that their friendship would become awkward and distant once more.

He's pleased to find that none of those things happen at all. Madi is perfectly willing to have the flame removed, now that they are at peace, and it's set to happen the following day.

"Let me know if I can do anything to help. You know, if you need anyone to watch her while she's recovering and you have to go out to work, or whatever." Bellamy offers to Clarke, once Madi has gone to bed and he is hovering on the doorstep, procrastinating over leaving. He feels a little awkward, and finds himself attempting to adopt a firm stance with his hands on his hips to conceal his discomfort.

"It shouldn't be a long recovery. She should be back on her feet within the day." Clarke explains, looking at him strangely.

"Yeah. Great. Just – let me know."

She's still got that unfathomable expression on her face. Has he said something wrong? Is he not allowed to express concern for Madi's wellbeing, since it is his decision that has landed her here? Is he not allowed to offer to help Clarke with things, any more?

It's not like that, he realises, all at once, as she flings her arms around his waist in a fierce hug. It's not like that at all.

"Thanks, Bellamy." Clarke murmurs against his chest. "Come over tomorrow afternoon? I know Madi would want to see you."

"Sure. Tomorrow afternoon. I'll see you then."

Clarke pulls back from the hug, and he misses her. But before she goes she just has to turn his world upside down one more time.

"I'm looking forward to seeing you, too." She says, and he can hear that she means it.

He decides, in that moment, that a Clarke who trusts him and wants him in her life – and her daughter's life – is the most attractive Clarke of all.

…...

He relaxes somewhat and allows himself simply to enjoy the pleasure of Clarke's company, a little more, now that she's made it quite clear she genuinely does like having him around. He knocks on her door most mornings to accompany her and Madi to breakfast, and deliberately plans his routes through the village such that he walks past wherever Clarke happens to be working and offers a friendly squeeze of his arm around her shoulders as he passes.

Friendly. Yeah, right.

He doesn't even bother making an excuse for his presence, when one of the cadets squishes his thumb whilst building the school and Bellamy insists on accompanying him to med bay. Bellamy knows that Clarke will be in med bay, knows that she is on duty this morning, so he's going to seize this opportunity to go there even if a squished thumb is not really the kind of injury that merits an escort.

"Bellamy? What are you doing here?" She asks urgently, with what he thinks is a hint of panic colouring her tone.

"I'm fine." He assures her quickly, realising how this must look. "Jenkins just caught his thumb in between some blocks. Can you take a look?"

"Sure." She beckons the hapless cadet forwards – the poor lad is shaking like a leaf. Bellamy isn't sure whether that's the pain of his relatively minor injury, the embarrassment of his petty accident, or the shame of being fussed over by the two people that run this place.

"Sorry to take up your time." Jenkins mutters. "Just – yeah. Squashed it. Sorry."

"Don't apologise." Clarke chides him sweetly, her rather warmer side on show. "Come on, let's get this seen to. I can take him from here, Bellamy."

He shakes his head. "I'll stay."

She doesn't argue, just smiles a little and permits him to follow her and her patient down the hallway. He's happy about that – he's never going to turn down a chance to see Clarke in her element like this, somehow simultaneously striding about the place with fierce confidence yet also treating Jenkins with kind concern.

It's kind of the perfect snapshot of everything that's wonderful about her, all the reasons he's hopelessly in love with her, all the ways in which she'd be the perfect mother to his children, if only she felt the same way about him.

He's not sure whether that's more pathetic or romantic, but he doesn't much care, either. Clarke's alive, and in his life, and she's looking up from her work bandaging the poor cadet's thumb to throw him a grin every few seconds, and he thinks that probably mornings on the ground don't get much better than this.

If anyone notices that Bellamy doesn't feel the same need to accompany the guard who sprains her wrist the next day – at a time when Clarke isn't on shift in med bay – no one mentions it.

That's just as well. He's fast running out of excuses for the way he behaves when it comes to Clarke.

…...

Here's another thing to add to his laughably long list of things he loves about Clarke. She always mucks in and does the dirty work herself, rather than holding onto her role as leader and insisting that such things are beneath her.

This morning, for example, she's helping to build the school. She's working alongside Bellamy and a dozen or so guards, out under the hot sun, digging the foundations of what will one day be a classroom.

She doesn't seem to have brought any water with her, Bellamy notes. And he really does try not to make too much of an overprotective fuss of her, in general, but he thinks that working in this weather without water is kind of stupid.

He picks up his own bottle and hands it over to her.

"Here. You should take a drink." He recommends.

She doesn't argue, which surprises him. She just nods, and thanks him, and takes a long swig from his water bottle.

He tries very hard not to stare while she does so. He tries not to stare at her lips, wrapped around the neck of the bottle, which make him think a little too vividly of her lips wrapped around something else. He tries not to stare at the droplet that escapes, running down her chin and down over the soft skin of her neck.

He tries not to stare, but he fails.

She finishes drinking, and as she secures the lid back on the bottle she throws him what looks an awful lot like a coy smirk. He does a double take, almost spins on the spot to see if there's anyone behind him. Is she really looking at _him_ with open heat in her gaze like that? That can't be right.

He takes the bottle back from her, barely listening to her words of thanks.

"You're welcome. You should bring your own tomorrow. Raven says it'll be hot again." He says gruffly.

And then he turns, and gets back on with digging.

He thinks a lot, as he digs. He supposes he ought to save fretting about Clarke for later, when he has some privacy and she's not working right there, mere metres away from him. But he spends most of his day with Clarke, and he plans to spend most of his night dreaming about her – especially after that moment with the bottle – so he's not at all sure when a better moment will present itself.

He just cannot fathom why she would be looking at him like that.

It's as he decided, all those months ago when he first felt his attraction to her flourishing once more. She's out of his league. She always has been, in terms of being the better person. And nowadays there is no contest when it comes to looks. She's absolutely glowing, confident in her new role, warm in motherhood, and he still hasn't got over how downright sexy she looks with that short haircut.

It makes him feel distinctly inadequate. He remembers being a cocky young guy who was pretty confident in his own looks, back at the dropship. But he's not that man any more, and he's convinced that he'd be lucky if Clarke gave him the time of day, now, had they not already been close friends before he went and left her behind.

He shaves his beard that night. It's silly – he knows having his chin on display isn't going to suddenly make Clarke love him as much as he loves her. But it makes him feel a little younger, a little fresher, a little less heavy with the weight of guilt and betrayal and putting that damn chip in Madi's head.

He looks in the mirror, now, and his face is smooth, and that ought to mean he recognises his younger self once more. It ought to mean _Clarke_ will recognise his younger self once more.

But it turns out that ten minutes and a razor can do nothing about the years of weariness in his eyes.

…...

He goes to Clarke and Madi's house to accompany them to breakfast the next day. He knocks on the door feeling almost hopeful, wondering if Clarke might say something about his new – old – look.

"Hey, Clarke." He greets her, the moment the door is open.

"Bellamy. Morning. Erm – you – you shaved?" She asks it as a question, even though the evidence is right in front of her.

Madi rolls her eyes as she joins the scene, but Bellamy is used to ignoring that by now.

"Yeah. I did." He summons his courage. "D'you like it?"

"I guess so, yeah. I mean – you looked fine before, too. You know? Fine with the beard, fine without the beard." He's never heard Clarke witter like that before, and it didn't ought to suit her. But somehow incoherent flustered Clarke is another face of Clarke's that he finds pretty hot, it seems. He'd quite like to send her incoherent from pleasure, one day, maybe with his lips between her legs. But he supposes her doorstep first thing in the morning is neither the time nor place to dwell on that.

He nods, half way to grinning. "Thanks, I guess. Shall we go eat?"

"Yeah. Hang on. I just need to – shoes." Clarke mutters, fleeing down the hallway.

Bellamy frowns. That seems like an odd interaction – most mornings, Clarke puts on the practical boots she keeps right here by the front door. But he mustn't allow himself to get his hopes up. He mustn't give into the temptation to imagine that he disturbs her composure in quite the same way she destroys his.

He intends to take the opportunity to have a chat with Madi while they're both standing here waiting for Clarke. She's been reading some Greek myths recently, and they've had several good conversations about them, so he's on the point of asking how she's getting on with Medusa when she pulls the rug out from under his feet.

"Good move, Bellamy. She always did prefer you without the beard." Madi offers casually, as if discussing the weather, not his poor desperate heart.

"She did?" He yelps.

"Yeah. I mean, it's not a deal-breaker, is it? She's crazy about _you_ , not your jawline. But I think this might speed things up a bit."

He's still trying to collect his thoughts, trying to decide whether what Madi just said can possibly be even half-true, when Clarke reappears and they all set out for breakfast.

…...

It's a marker of just how much his friendship with Clarke has flourished, in Eden, that Bellamy isn't even surprised when he gets invited on a day trip with her and Madi. They're going to salvage medical supplies from the old Polis bunker, Clarke explains, but they plan to make an outing of it and eat a picnic along the way. He'd be welcome to come but, of course, she understands that he must be busy with his job.

He's never too busy to spend the day with Clarke and Madi.

He waits for them at the rover, bright and early on the morning of the trip. Clarke said she would bring the picnic, but he has a few apples in his pack, too. Just because he figures it would be rude to show up to such an outing empty-handed.

He wonders whether anyone else is joining them, or whether this is a family trip he has been invited on. He's hoping that it's just the three of them, obviously he is, but he doesn't like to get too carried away. For all he knows, half the village is coming along for the ride, and he's being foolish by getting overexcited and hoping this might mean something.

By the size of the picnic bag Clarke is holding when she arrives with Madi, he thinks that maybe, it really might be just the three of them. But rather than celebrating that news too loudly, he spends a few seconds throwing apples to Madi, who catches them and has a go at juggling with them.

She can't juggle, it turns out. But he's quite fond of the kid, and they have a good laugh at her failure for a few seconds, so he resigns himself without complaint to the fact he's likely to be the one eating the bruised apples she has dropped, later.

"Who's sitting where?" Clarke asks brightly, popping her bag in the back of the rover and effectively calling a halt to the juggling.

"I'll drive." Bellamy volunteers. That's a useful contribution he could make, he figures, to show his gratitude for the invitation.

Clarke frowns. "No you won't."

"Really, I don't mind. I'd be happy to." Why can she not just let him do her a favour, damn it?

"I'm driving. It's my rover, now." She insists, and he can see that she has a point. He should have realised she has grown used to driving herself around, after all those years without him to volunteer at every opportunity.

Madi really must stop rolling her eyes. "I'm hopping in the back. Looks like you're riding shotgun, Bellamy." She informs him, clambering into the rover.

Well, now. He wouldn't like to disobey a direct order from the former Commander, and certainly not when he's fast coming to think of the child as family. With that decided, he takes his seat.

He tries very hard not to stare at Clarke as they roll out of the village. It's difficult, because staring at her is kind of his thing, by now. And it's difficult, too, because driving a rover around used to be one of his roles in her life. He can't decide whether he regrets losing that role, or whether he just finds it downright sexy that she's so confident in her independence, these days.

It doesn't matter, he decides in the end. He's just going to live in the moment and enjoy a day trip with his family. And if he adopts a habit of squeezing Clarke's thigh to gain her attention when he wants to point out a passing bird or a ruined town on the horizon, he doesn't think that's worthy of notice. He just wants to share his joy in the day with her.

…...

Bellamy should have known that the peaceful politeness between him and Clarke could not last forever. Passionate disagreement has always been part of their relationship, so he figures he should have realised it was only a matter of time until their next major argument.

The thing is, he's in love, and he naively thought they might have been done with arguing.

The school is nearly finished, now. The classrooms are ready. And Bellamy has just made the mistake of asking whether they are to build some kind of sports hall and shooting range for the school, or whether the kids will share facilities with the guards.

"Shooting range?" Clarke cries, half way to a flat-out scream. " _Shooting range_? Why the hell would we build a school _shooting range_ , Bellamy? Do you have any idea at all what _peace_ is?"

"Better safe than sorry. We wouldn't be teaching them because we plan on fighting a war. Just because on the ground it's useful to know how to -"

"No. Not any more. Not when I have spent the last year working myself to the bone to build this town as a place for _peace._ " She's crying, and he doesn't blame her. He wants to cry, too.

But he does think he's right, so he carries on. "They wouldn't be learning so they could shoot people. They'd be learning it as a useful skill. Like I taught you, and you taught Madi."

"I taught her because I knew sooner or later some _monster_ would try to put that chip in her head." He flinches, more hurt than he would have been if she'd slapped him in the face again. He thought they were past this. He thought they'd moved on.

He thought wrong, it seems.

He storms off, dashing a hand across his eyes, in search of a tree that he can punch until his knuckles hurt more than his heart.

…...

He goes to find Clarke later that evening. He still thinks he's right, and he's still annoyed with her for refusing to see his side of the issue and for throwing what he did to Madi back at him after all these months. But he cares too much about Clarke to cling to this rage any longer.

He's marshalled a few more logical arguments, as well. Things about hunting, for example, and whether there are other Eligius ships still out there.

It's later than Madi's usual bedtime, so he knocks softly at Clarke's front door and waits to see if she will forgive him far enough to let him come in and talk.

She answers within moments, a trembling smile on her face. "Hey. Thanks for stopping by."

"Any time." He tells her, and means it. "Can we talk? About – about what happened earlier?"

She nods, pulls back to beckon him inside. "Madi missed you at movie night." She offers calmly, as they walk to the living room together.

"Sorry about that. I wasn't sure I'd be welcome."

"You're always welcome in our house, even when we've been arguing." She assures him, firm. "We always did argue, didn't we? And then get over it? I'm just sorry I said what I said about Madi. I was upset, but I shouldn't have dragged that into it."

"Hey, hey, it's OK." They're sitting on the couch, now, and he takes a risk and wraps an arm around her shoulders. "I get it, really I do. And I'm so sorry for putting her in danger all those months ago. I'll tell you that every day if I have to."

"You don't have to. I know, and I forgave you a long time ago." She tells him, relaxing her head onto his shoulder.

Of course, he still needs to discuss the difficult question. That's what he came here for, and he's been preparing his words all afternoon. "I don't want to upset you again, but I think we're not done talking about it. From a security standpoint I think it's important that all adult citizens are proficient with rifles in case there are other Eligius ships out there, or some other threat we don't even know about yet. And hunting is easier with a gun than with a bow."

"You know, I hate it sometimes, that you're head of security and I'm – whatever I am. Do you ever wish we could just be Bellamy and Clarke?" She asks softly.

He steels himself to be honest. "I think that's what's so great about us. That we can do our jobs and still just be ourselves with each other, most of the time. I'm sorry – we can finish discussing this in the morning if you want. Maybe we shouldn't talk work in your living room."

"No, it's fine. I just want it done and decided. You said _all adult citizens_ , just now. Maybe that's the way to look at it? We don't introduce weapons training until they're older? We have some lessons about history and – and _humanity_ – so that they know shooting is not the answer to everything before they learn how to hold a gun?"

"That sounds perfect." He agrees easily, because it does. That's the thing about him and Clarke – they're a pretty perfect team when it comes to running this place, he likes to think.

They sit there in silence for a little while. Clarke still has her head on his shoulder, and it's pleasant. It's a hell of a lot more pleasant than he thought it would be, when he came over here just now to grovel at her feet.

At length, Clarke talks again. "It was stupid of me to get so worked up about it earlier. I'm sorry. It's just – Madi. It felt like you were saying we should keep putting kids in danger. That we should keep putting _my kid_ in danger."

"I didn't want that. I worry about her quite a bit myself, these days." He admits, wondering whether that's allowed. Wondering whether he has her permission to feel a certain paternal protectiveness towards her daughter.

"Yeah. I know. I always knew you'd be good with her." She tells him, voice warm, snuggling her head a little closer into his embrace.

Just for a moment, he feels hope flare in his chest. That sounds like the kind of thing Clarke might say if she thought he wasn't a completely lost cause as a prospective parent, he thinks. If he squints, really hard, he can almost pretend to himself that she might be interested in conceiving a child or two with him, one day.

No. He's being silly, reading far more into her words than she can possibly have intended.

They sit there a while longer. Bellamy's going slightly crazy, having Clarke near him like this, warm in his arms, and trusting him, and seemingly happy. He'd give anything for them to stay like this forever – or perhaps to take things a step further.

But there's something he's been wanting to say to her for a while, now.

"It's kind of nice to see that you care so much about Madi, that you'd do anything for her. That must sound odd but I mean – it's great that you've found someone you love so much."

She sighs. "It sounds like you're forgetting that time I couldn't shoot you to save the human race." She mutters, somewhere between affectionate and annoyed.

Well, now. He's never looked at it like that before. Is she saying that he's that essential to her, too? That she loves him even half as much as he loves her?

It sends a thrill of excitement and hope and, yes, desire straight to the pit of his stomach. He ought to act on this, right? But he doesn't know how to act on this. He doesn't have a clue how to go about declaring his love to his closest friend, and he's pretty worried he might disrupt this comfortable bit of cuddling they have going on if he tried.

He doesn't do anything wild or make any grand gestures, in the end. He squeezes her a little tighter, presses his lips to the crown of her head briefly before leaning his cheek against her hair.

Because she is Clarke, and he is Bellamy, and finding love in the small, everyday gestures has always been what they do best.

…...

Bellamy is annoyed with himself.

That happens quite often, remember? Sure, his self-loathing has been a little lighter, since he's patched things up with Clarke, but it's still a feature of his personality he thinks he will probably never manage to shed altogether.

Today he doesn't quite hate himself. He's just annoyed with himself, and for a ridiculous reason.

He's thirty years old, has lived some of the most formative months of his life on the ground, and yet he's just managed to stab himself in the forearm in the process of killing a boar. The boar came off worse, to be clear. It's now dead, throat slit, a few bullets lodged in its side, and Miller and Murphy are carrying it back to the village.

But Bellamy has managed to pick up this minor wound in the struggle, so he heads to Clarke to sort it out.

He feels a bit bad about disturbing her. It's the middle of the afternoon, and he knows she was hoping to enjoy some quiet time home alone while Madi is out at school. But he figures that asking Clarke to patch him up is a better move than showing up in med bay and admitting that the head of security can't even handle a knife without hurting himself.

There's that, and there's also the fact that he really wants to see her.

She smiles widely as she opens the door. "Bellamy. Hey." Then she takes in the scene and starts to frown. "Why is your T shirt on your arm and not on – you know – you?"

He feels his chest grow warm under her gaze. "I cut myself. It's not bad. Can you take a look?"

"I can take a look." She agrees, and he wonders for a moment if they're talking about the wound, right now. She seems to be staring at his chest more than rushing to deal with his arm.

He risks a glance down at his own stomach. He's not doing too badly, he guesses. She was probably just noticing his torso in an objective sort of way. He can't give into the temptation to read anything more in her warm gaze.

She ushers him into the house and unwraps his makeshift bandage, tutting slightly, then sets to work on cleaning the wound and covering it with a more appropriate dressing. It doesn't take her long – he knew it wouldn't – and within minutes he is standing, still shirtless, in the middle of Clarke's living room and realising he ought to leave. She has her hand on his arm, just above the bandage, which seems unnecessary. She's done fixing him up but she's still touching him. Does that mean what he hopes it means?

"Why didn't you go to med bay?" She asks, as if the question has only just occurred to her.

"I didn't want them to laugh at me." He says, which is part of the truth.

"You didn't think I'd laugh at you?" For some inexplicable reason she seems to have decided she needs to run that hand up his arm, now, as far as his shoulders, and start playing with the curls at the base of his neck.

He gives in. It's as simple as that. He's spent his whole life believing that he's not allowed happiness, that his role is to protect others, not seek out joy for himself. And he's spent the better part of a year, now, being the most determinedly platonic friend to this infuriatingly attractive woman.

But now, in this moment, he gives into temptation and kisses her.

She doesn't run away, and his world does not fall apart around his ears. Quite the opposite – she kisses him back, hard, her hand sliding up his neck to cup the back of his head and pull him down to meet her. And then her other hand is rubbing over the bare skin of his back, and he's beginning to think that, really, he should have showed up at Clarke's house injured and shirtless months ago.

"We should have done this years ago." She pants against his mouth, and he lets out a gasp that has more to do with shock than arousal.

"You wanted this too?" He spends a precious second of kissing time on asking her.

"More than you know." She affirms, and gets back on with kissing him in earnest.

He knows where Clarke's bedroom is. He's been spending a lot of time in this house in recent months. But he's never allowed himself to open the door to her room, even when she has tried to send him in there on errands or ask for his help with moving furniture. Excuse after excuse after excuse, he has found a reason to turn her down, because he always knew that seeing her bed would be his undoing.

He's in her room now, though, as Clarke drags him by the hand. And he realises, rather abruptly, that he will never stop seeing images of her blond hair splayed out over these pillows, after this, every time he closes his eyes at night.

He backs her up against the wall, rather than heading straight for the bed. He wants to feel her beneath him and on top of him, of course he does, but he's been dreaming of this for months – or possibly years – and there are several other things he wants to try first.

She likes making out with him like this, pressed up against the wall, his hips pushing into her and his kisses urgent. He can tell that, because she's moaning loudly, the sound of it going straight to his cock. Somehow, he manages to relieve her of her shirt, even while they're cramped against the wall. And then, all of a sudden, they're both shedding the rest of their clothes, as they pull apart, panting.

Panting, and apparently completely unable to stop smiling at each other.

She makes the next move, urging him back onto the bed. He goes along with it, because Clarke taking the lead in the bedroom is something he's always found pretty exciting, as a concept, and the truth of it exceeds his expectations as her bare skin slides against his. She's on top of him, now, leaning partly on her elbows but mostly just letting her weight push him down into the bed as her lips move from his mouth, down his neck, along his collarbone.

She's sucking at the skin somewhere near his shoulder when it happens. He should have known it was only a matter of time.

"I love you." He groans, inappropriately loud, inappropriately honest.

He panics for a moment, just half a second or so. He wonders whether he can pass it off as just a casual thing he sometimes says during sex, but that seems unlikely. And he certainly cannot claim he means it platonically, not given their current situation.

He stops panicking very abruptly when she removes her lips from his shoulder, sits up, and speaks.

"I love you, too. You really picked your moment there, didn't you?"

It's testament to the affection in her voice that he manages to concentrate on her words rather than the distracting sight of her breasts as she hovers over him. He feels his face heating with embarrassment at her teasing reprimand, but somehow, embarrassment doesn't feel quite so much like shame as he used to think it did.

Clarke, of course, seems completely unconcerned by his ill-timed confession. She always has been difficult to unsettle. But she's not _unmoved_ – he can tell. Her eyes are glowing as she bends close to his lips once more.

"You think you could tell me that again in about five seconds?" She whispers in his ear, before kissing him soundly.

Five seconds? What happens in five seconds?

He gets his answer, when she eases herself lower down his body, pressing kisses to his stomach as she goes, and then takes his cock in her mouth.

"I love you." He gasps, because she did tell him to.

"Good timing." She tells him, tone approving, then seals her lips around the length of him once more.

He's a little puzzled by this odd conversation they're having. He's not sure whether to characterise it as dirty talk or as two friends having a laugh.

It's both. That's what he decides. It's both, and it's glorious, and Clarke's mouth is every bit as talented as he always knew it would be. He knits a hand into her hair and groans louder, not words this time, but incoherent noises dragged from his throat by the feel of her mouth, the sight of her working his cock, the knowledge that she's really here, and this is really happening, and not some creepy fantasy of his own making.

She keeps at her task for a couple of minutes before Bellamy uses his grip on her hair to ease her head away.

"Your turn now." He tells her.

"But I'm not done here." She pouts, and it's not an expression he's ever seen on her face before, but he adds it to that absurdly long list of things he loves about her.

"Maybe I'll let you finish it another time." He teases, trying to remember how to speak coherently. She's doing funny things to his brain, but he likes it.

He can't decide what he wants to try next. There are too many options, and he's struggling to know where to start. In the end, he urges Clarke to lie on the bed and finds himself eating her out whilst stretching up to fondle a breast with one hand, the other hand sort of resting on her hips and simply enjoying the softness of her skin.

He's so far gone for her it's just silly, at this point.

She's very appreciative while he eats her out. He always suspected she'd be a talker, and she doesn't disappoint, murmuring words of love and encouragement and, of course, the occasional item of decisive constructive criticism. She wouldn't be Clarke if she were any different, and he loves her for it.

But it's when she stops talking that he really finds himself losing his mind, grinding against the bed and desperately seeking friction. It's when her words turn to groans, and then to moans and gasps and incoherent little noises that tell him she's falling apart for him.

She lets go, coming hard, and after all that noise there's only a breathy sigh as she tumbles over the edge.

He wouldn't have it any other way. He wouldn't have any of this any other way, and that's that.

"I always new you'd be good at that." She informs him, trying for a conversational tone, but the dazed look in her eyes rather gives her away, he thinks.

"Have you been thinking about this?" He asks, needing to hear her say it.

"I've been thinking about this. I've been thinking about _you_ , Bellamy. I've been thinking about your mouth and I've definitely been thinking about this." She murmurs, reaching down to wrap a hand around his cock.

He pushes her a little further. He can't seem to help it. "And what have you been thinking about me?" He asks, in between kisses.

"I've been thinking about you inside of me. I've been thinking of you in this bed with me." She admits, refusing to meet his gaze.

Well, now. That's an interesting development. Clarke gets a little shy when she talks about her fantasies. Who knew?

"I've been thinking about this, too." He tells her, voice hoarse.

She appears to gather confidence from that, looking up to meet his eyes. "Yeah? What have you been thinking?"

He steels his courage. He loves her, and she loves him, and he might as well just come out and say it. If there's one thing he knows about his relationship with Clarke, it's that waiting around for nature to take its course has not served him well, in the past.

He clears his throat. "I've been thinking of making a baby with you. I've been thinking of coming inside you and you carrying my baby and us starting a family."

She jumps on him. There's simply no other word for it. She falls on him in a tangle of limbs, both rolling together, kissing desperately.

"I want that." She tells him, in case her answer wasn't already clear. "I've wanted that for so long."

He takes her at her word, eases her onto her back on the bed, and pushes carefully inside of her.

It's good. Of course it's good – he's been in love with this woman since before he even worked out what love is. And her hair is getting in his eyes and her fingernails are clutching at his butt and it's enough to send him out of his mind with pleasure. She's making those incoherent little noises, again, and he thinks he'll never get tired of hearing her lose her mind over him.

It doesn't last long, because he's a bit overwhelmed if he's being entirely honest. But that's OK, he figures. They'll have other opportunities to take their time, by the sounds of it. Clarke beats him to it, today, clenching hard about his cock, and then he's spilling inside of her with a groan.

He's spilling inside of her, and making a start on making that baby.

They lie there for a moment, sweaty and breathless, and happy – or at least, he hopes they're both happy.

"To be clear, I actually do love you. That wasn't just because we were – you know." He clarifies, feeling a bit awkward.

"I know. You're not subtle, you know?" She giggles a little, and he likes that she can giggle, these days. "I love you, too."

Well, then. That's good. He realises he should probably stop squishing her, and rolls over onto his back, taking her with him so that she ends up snuggled into his chest.

Another moment of peace, and then she breaks the silence. "You know what you just said about – about making a baby. I want that with you, really I do. But – you do realise we already have a family, right?"

He feels a smile spreading across his face as he hugs her tight. They should probably have hashed this out before jumping into bed, but he cannot find it within himself to complain. He and Clarke have always had a wonderful habit of tackling the serious stuff together with the not-so-serious, so he supposes that discussing parenthood during sex was always going to be their way.

In his defence, he doesn't think it's as tasteless as that chocolate cake joke he made when he was younger and stupider.

"I love Madi." He says it out loud for the first time. "And I'd be honoured to be considered her father. But I wouldn't like to pressure you or her about that after what I did last year."

"It'll be up to her." Clarke says. "That's best, right? She's a teenager now, she's old enough to decide whether that's how she sees her relationship with you."

"That feels right." He agrees, because pretty much everything about today has felt right, as far as he's concerned.

"You should move in." Clarke informs him, as if that's trivial, at this point. As if she has any right to give him orders, he thinks with a smile

"You sure? Already?" He wants to, of course he does, but he doesn't want to rush her.

"We've been heading this way for years. I think it's time now, don't you?"

"Yeah. Sure. I'd like that. I guess – I'll go get my stuff." If she really does want him to move now, he'd better put some pants on, he thinks, starting to shuffle away from her.

She stops him with a hand on his chest. "When I said _now_ – maybe a little later? Maybe we could do some more work on making that baby, first?" She suggests coyly.

He laughs, joy blooming in his chest, and hugs her even tighter. "Give me five minutes, maybe? And then I'm all yours."

"You've been _all mine_ for years." She declares, as if that's just a fact. As if it's not even up for debate.

As if she wants the whole world to know that she belongs to him, and he belongs to her, and that's the way it is.

"I have." He agrees. Not because he intends to let her order him around in this relationship, or anything. Just because she's hot when she's being all decisive like that, and it really gets his rover running.

And that's a good thing, at this point, because the two of them have a brood of children to conceive.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
